


Eventually

by mggislife2789



Category: Criminal Minds, Spencer Reid - Fandom
Genre: F/M, Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-18
Updated: 2017-02-18
Packaged: 2018-09-25 10:18:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,641
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9815312
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mggislife2789/pseuds/mggislife2789
Summary: Disclaimer: I don't own any of these characters or their original stories. This is only for fun. It's where my brain goes after the credits roll. No copyright intended. Better safe than sorry. ;)





	

After three years of this, you realized you couldn’t do it anymore. When you first started at the BAU, you’d immediately become close with everyone, especially Spencer. For a year and a half or so, all you felt for Spencer was platonic love, and then one weekend, early last year, you’d come down with a horrible case of the flu; every day after work, Spencer came over and took care of you. He did your laundry and dishes, and even brought you your favorite chicken soup from the diner down the street. Since then, your feelings changed. 

You thought about him all the time. Running your fingers through his hair. Kissing his soft pink lips. Caressing his cheek. Thoughts of him wouldn’t leave your mind and you knew he’d never reciprocate those feelings. Originally, you tried to deal with them, push them away and hoping they disappeared, but they’d persisted, and you couldn’t take the pain of knowing he’d never feel the same way anymore - at least while you were around him every day. You needed a fresh start.

The department was always at risk of having their funds cut and you were the newest edition to the team. On top of that, with your Ph.D. in microbiology and immunology and your age, you were sought after to teach - specifically by George Washington University. For nearly a year, they had been asking you to head the microbiology and immunology department, as well as their Ph.D. program, but because you did love your job, and were holding out hope in regards to Spencer’s feelings, you hadn’t accepted the position.

Now you wanted to. After calling the department to ask if they still wanted to offer you that position, you strode into Hotch’s office to give him your letter of resignation. “What’s this?” Hotch asked, staring at the letter in confusion.

Doing your best to make it seem like this wasn’t killing you inside, you spoke. “It’s a letter of resignation, Hotch.”

“Is there something wrong?” he wondered. Hotch was normally not one to show emotion, but he seemed saddened by the thought of you leaving. You didn’t want to leave; you loved your job and the family you’d made, but you couldn’t be in the same room with Spencer anymore without your heart breaking. 

On the fly, you came up with a quick excuse for the letter. “Well, you know the department has been threatened with cutbacks for at least a year now, and for the last year I’ve been getting offered the position of Head of the Department of Microbiology and Immunology at George Washington University. My grandparents are getting sick now and my parents aren’t able to take care of everything by themselves, so I figured if I had more regulated hours, I would be able to help them out.” It seemed like a good reason for leaving. Hotch didn’t totally buy it, but he acquiesced. 

“You always have family here, Y/N,” he said, placing the letter on a stack of papers you know he’d been putting off looking at for ages. “I hope you know that.”

Before you turned to leave, you nodded, attempting to stifle the need to cry. This was not what you wanted, but right now, it’s what you needed. “I know, Hotch,” you replied. “If you don’t mind, I’d like to keep it between the two of us until the last possible moment. It’s not easy for me, but I need to do this right now.”

“Our little secret for the next two weeks,” he said sadly. With that, you left for the day. When you closed the door to your car, you sobbed uncontrollably, pulling out of the parking lot as quickly as possible so no one would see your despair.

Over the course of the next two weeks, you acted as if nothing had changed, using your skills of deception to put on a happy face, even though you were anything but. The day before you left, Hotch made the announcement. “Everyone,” he started, “Today is going to be Y/N’s last day. She’s been offered the role of Head of the Department of Microbiology and Immunology at George Washington University.”

“You’re leaving?” Garcia asked with tears in her eyes. “Why?”

As your eyes scanned the room, your own tears started to form, so you made them work to your advantage. Everyone around you was tearing, and as your eyes turned toward Spencer you noticed his devastation. 

“I’ve been getting offers for this position for the last year and it has more steady hours. My grandparents are all getting sick and my parents aren’t able to handle all of their medical care themselves, so I figured a steadier job would allow me to help them.” That seemed to be enough for most everyone, although you could see that Rossi and Spencer weren’t exactly buying it.

This was the fresh start you needed. It hurt. But you’d get passed it - eventually. 

——–

When Spencer walked into the bullpen the day after Y/N’s departure, he looked at her empty desk - standing in the middle of the room for nearly ten minutes in a stupor. “I can’t believe she’s gone,” Morgan said, clapping Spencer on the shoulder as he arrived for the morning. 

“Me either,” Spencer sighed, walking toward her desk and sitting in her chair. “She’s my best friend. I don’t know why she didn’t tell me.” He noticed his lips started to quiver as he thought about how much he’d miss seeing her every day. “Why wouldn’t she tell me?” he asked Morgan.

“You saw how she was yesterday. It seemed like a tough decision. But it also seemed like she needed to make it. You know Y/N, she’s no fuss,” he said. “She probably didn’t want all of the attention.”

Spencer understood, but it still hurt. Over the last three years, they’d become incredibly close. She was without a doubt his best friend in the world. Morgan walked past her desk to his own, getting started for the morning, as Spencer sat there numbly, wondering what he was supposed to do. It was like he didn’t know how to function. 

Just yesterday, her desk was filled with papers, pictures of her family, pictures of the team, figurines and paperweights. There was even a picture of the two of them dressed up at last year’s local Comic Con. Now everything was gone. He rifled through the drawers, wondering - maybe hoping - that something would pop up; something that might explain why she’d quit so abruptly. If her excuse was truly the reason she left, he understood, but it seemed like she was hiding something. Most of his assumptions weren’t good.

Each of the drawers came up empty until the bottom left one. The only thing left was a notepad. Months ago, Y/N had confided in him that her therapist suggested writing letters to everyone she loved as a way to say things that she couldn’t say out loud. The exercise had started because of her somewhat strained relationship with her father, but when he looked down at the notepad, he saw that she’d written a letter to everyone. The two pages that had been ripped off were probably the letters she’d written to her parents, but when he flipped through the pages he saw everyone’s names - JJ, Emily, Penelope, Derek, Hotch, Rossi, and his name, what only she and JJ called him, Spence.

As he looked around the room, he wondered whether or not he should be reading this. It was something that was suggested by a therapist, but she had left it here and he desperately wanted to see if his suspicions of a deeper reason for leaving rang true. Almost 20 minutes had passed and the rest of the team was in, so he took the notepad and went to his desk, burying his head in the paper while he sipped at his coffee.

\---

Spence,

Have we really been friends for three years? It seems like we’ve known each other forever. I’ve never known anyone else that gets me like you do and I can’t even begin to tell you how much you mean to me. Well, my therapist’s instructions were to write down everything you felt about a person with no filter, so here it goes. I’ll probably never give you this letter because I’m too much of a chicken shit, but, remember when I was sick last year and you came over every day? Since then, something has changed in the way I feel about you. Where once it was going to a Comic Con or a foreign film on the weekends, I now find myself thinking about being with you. I don’t know why my feelings changed or how, but they did - and I don’t think I’ll ever have the courage to tell you, especially because I doubt you feel the same way…

That felt really good to write down.

Love Always,

Y/N

\---

At the bottom of the paper, she had written a note to tell her therapist how cleansing an activity the note had been. 

When Spencer looked up from the paper, he wondered. Did she leave because of him? He didn’t want to assume that, but given how recently she’d written the letter - about three weeks prior - he couldn’t help but feel like there was some connection. Why didn’t she tell him? What made her think that he had no feelings for her? The only reason he’d never said anything was because he assumed she didn’t like him like that and didn’t want to put the friendship at risk. 

If she left because of him, he needed her to know the truth. If she had actually left because of family troubles, he needed her to know anyway. He had to see her.


End file.
